Tag Archives: California Dreams

Well, now Jimmy Fallon has done it all. His greatest feat was not a dead-on parody of the Real Housewives, or Late Night‘s own version of Rockapella, or even his engineering of the California Dreams reunion. Nope. Fallon’s biggest coup to date is presenting a musical performance that would fascinate both us and our dad. And with this performance of “Party in the USA,” with Fallon in the guise of Neil Young and joined by Young’s sometimes bandmates David Crosby and Graham Nash, Jimmy accomplishes just that. Crobsy, (Stills,) Nash, & Young is perhaps our dad’s favorite musical group of all time; certainly Crosby is the singer whose mustache our father would most try to emulate if he were a folk rock luminary. And, as for us, we never tire of Fallon’s remarkable, often stunning, impressions. Not when he was on SNL, and not now. At this point Jimmy probably sounds more like Neil Young than Neil Young does. So, Late Night, thank you for brining a father and son together (in front of a computer screen, not saying a word to one another).

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And, in case you were curious, here’s an abridged version of said venn diagram.

It’s really hard to pinpoint when we fully realized the genius of Late Night with Fallon, because there have been so many brilliant moments, like the California Dreams reunion, or the Muppets dropping by to sing “The 12 Days of Christmas”, or the visit from Zack Morris, or the Lost homage “Late,” or the Parks & Recreation-assisted Glee‘d version of “We’re Not Gonna Take It.” It’s really been an incredible twelve months for Jimmy Fallon and his team, whom we’ve praised over and over again, and plan to keep doing so. But, for us, there was perhaps no greater pop-culture tribute than Late Night‘s very own incarnation of the a capella legends Rockapella, which they gifted us in March of this year. Lost, Glee, even Saved by the Bell, those are rather obvious objects of affection. But to channel something like Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?‘s house band, well that’s truly special, and perhaps more than anything else Late Night has done that showed the depth of their knowledge, humor, intelligence, and a disturbing awareness of references from our childhood that we will go crazy for.

And, just in time for the holiday season, they’ve done it again (this time with more Jason Segel!):

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Hats off, once again, gentleman. Brava.

By the way, did you know that Rockapella founder Sean Altman auditioned for Season 1 of NBC’s The Sing-Off with his new a capella group the GrooveBarbers? They didn’t make the cut. Which somehow feels like if Marcel Marceau was rejected from a mime competition. Must have been the name. Oh, and it sorta sounds like he’s taking credit for the success of The Sing Off. Sure, why not?

Talking up the good work that Jimmy Fallon and the Late Night crew have been doing is nothing new on this blog. In fact, we’ve been complimenting their efforts as far back as last Fall. But with the show celebrating its one year anniversary last week, and with the program demonstrating as much creativity and spontaneity as any show in late night today (effectively filling the absurdity vacuum left by Conan), we thought it fitting to highlight some recent clips to show how Jimmy continues to impress (and then one more to illustrate how in other respects he continues to disappoint).

Late Night has particularly excelled in slickly produced, exceptionally accurate television parodies, first with the Hills spoof 7th Floor West and then with The Real Housewives of Late Night. The show has continued this hot streak by taking on the height of the pop culture phenomena, Lost, with their new recurring series, Late. Below is the 2nd episode, as the castaways (brought together by an elevator crash and now stranded on a creepy abandoned office floor) struggle to make sense of their new and mysterious surroundings.